Viscount

How to spell viscount

8 letters · 2 syllables

12 of the 37 people asked to spell viscount in Spelling Garden got it wrong the first time.

The most common mistake is vicount. The letters people get wrong are highlighted.

vicount viscount

What people typed instead

• vicount7 people

How to pronounce viscount

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does viscount mean?

1. nounA nobleman ranking below an earl or count and above a baron.

Viscount in a sentence

• The viscount inherited the family estate after his father died.

• Records show that the viscount held land across three counties.

Where does viscount come from?

Language of origin: French

This word comes from the Old French visconte, which in turn rests on the Medieval Latin vicecomes, meaning a deputy or stand-in for a count. That Latin form joins vice, meaning 'in the place of', to comes, which literally meant 'companion' and came to denote a 'count' or court official; so a vicecomes was originally an officer who acted on a count's behalf. English borrowed the word in the 1300s as a rank of nobility sitting between a baron and an earl, and in some periods it also named a sheriff or other royal deputy. The spelling kept its Latinate 's' from vice even though that letter fell silent in speech, which is exactly the trap: the word is pronounced 'VY-count' yet must still be written with the 's'. The same vice element survives in plain English words like 'vice-president' and 'viceroy', a useful reminder of why the silent letter belongs there.

How the word is built

• vis- (from Latin vice: in place of, deputy)
• count (a nobleman, from Latin comes: companion)